Assessing Assessment at the Forum

PAEA’s Assessment team recounts their various contributions to the 2018 Education Forum.

The PAEA Assessment team’s guiding principle is to educate and support programs to graduate knowledgeable and competent PAs who will improve health for all. To that end, we were especially busy at this year’s Education Forum providing professional development, education, and leadership surrounding assessment principles. We also had the opportunity to educate members about the intended purpose and use of PACKRAT™ and End of Rotation™ exams, along with our upcoming End of Curriculum™ exam, due to be released in January 2020.

Our team led seven sessions on assessment and interacted with hundreds of members. We kicked off the Forum by hosting a two-day workshop called Building a Culture of Assessment, where participants focused on the importance of assessment and what it can tell us about our students, our teaching, and our programs.

For the second year, 40 brave faculty members ably took on the challenge of taking a PAEA End of Rotation exam. During the popular Trading Places: PAEA End of Rotation Exam Preview for Faculty session, participants experienced the full student exam experience, starting with receiving the scheduling notice and sitting for a proctored exam administration. For the first time this year, we also provided faculty with a score report. The post-session discussion focused on proctoring strategies and the exam delivery system to help participants improve the experience for their students.

Three separate education sessions — Summing It Up: Using the PAEA End of Curriculum Exams, SCPE-ing Along: Using the PAEA End of Rotation Exams, and Hackathon: Building a SCPE Evaluation — focused on teaching members about the multiple components of SCPEs and summative evaluations, as well as how to align exam content with educational objectives.

The PACKRAT Exam Development Board (EDB) continued their tradition of hosting the PACKRAT Item Writing Workshop — something they have done annually at the Forum for well over a decade now. This workshop demonstrates the EDB’s commitment to sharing their expertise in item writing and reviewing high-quality exam items with new faculty.

To put it simply, this was another successful Forum, and the Assessment team would like to thank all attendees for being so engaged. As always, feel free to reach out to us at exams@PAEAonline.org if we can answer any questions about PAEA exams. And please check out a new video announcement posted on PAEAonline.org/Assessment to learn more about PAEA’s full suite of exams.

Olivia Ziegler, PA

Olivia is PAEA’s chief assessment officer. She has a background in PA education and joined PAEA in 2013.

About PAEA®

The Physician Assistant Education Association (PAEA) is the only national organization representing PA educational programs. PAEA works to ensure quality PA education through the development and distribution of educational services and products specifically geared toward meeting the emerging needs of PA programs, the PA profession, and the health care industry.